Brand New (band)
Brand New is an American rock band formed in 2000 from Long Island, New York. Consisting of lead vocalist and rhythm guitarist Jesse Lacey, lead guitarist Vincent Accardi, bassist Garrett Tierney and drummer Brian Lane, the band earned critical recognition as one of the most influential emo bands, and was acclaimed for their musical development and artistic innovation compared to other groups in the scene from which they originated.
In the 1990s, Lacey, Tierney and Lane played in the Levittown band the Rookie Lot, and Brand New was formed with Accardi after Lacey left his position as the founding bassist for Taking Back Sunday. The band signed to Triple Crown Records and released a pop punk debut album Your Favorite Weapon. The band began to incorporate indie rock influences on their second album Deja Entendu, released in 2003 to positive reviews over the band's stylistic changes. Its two singles "The Quiet Things That No One Ever Knows" and "Sic Transit Gloria... Glory Fades" both entered the top 40 on the UK Singles Chart. Deja Entendu was eventually certified Gold in the US.
The demos for the band's major label debut on Interscope Records were leaked onto the internet in 2006. After reworking the material, the band released The Devil and God Are Raging Inside Me, which earned retrospective critical acclaim for its influence on emo. It was also certified Gold in the US, and the single "Jesus Christ" peaked at number 30 on Billboard's Alternative Songs chart. Accardi's role as a lyricist increased on the band's fourth album Daisy, which debuted at number six on the Billboard 200 and featured a more post-hardcore and noise rock sound.
While Brand New toured consistently and played several prominent festivals, the band went six years without releasing music before the singles "Mene" and "I Am a Nightmare" surfaced. Brand New's fifth and most recent album, Science Fiction, was surprise-released in August 2017 through the band's own record label, Procrastinate! Music Traitors. It debuted at number-one on the Billboard 200, receiving both critical acclaim and commercial success. The band repeatedly announced plans to break up in 2018, but remained inactive for seven years without an official announcement of a breakup in the wake of 2017 sexual misconduct allegations against Lacey. The band reunited in 2024 for a charity show, followed by a US and UK tour in 2025.
History
Formation and ''Your Favorite Weapon'' (2000–2002)
In the late 1990s, Jesse Lacey, Garrett Tierney and Brian Lane were all members of the Levittown, New York post-hardcore band the Rookie Lot, along with Brandon Reilly and Alex Dunne of Crime in Stereo. The Rookie Lot split and did not play for a while until Lacey, Lane and Tierney started to rehearse again. After Reilly joined The Movielife, they recruited guitarist Vincent Accardi from the band One Last Goodbye. The quartet all lived within ten minutes of each other.All four members had backgrounds linking into their local Long Island independent and hardcore music scenes, but with influences ranging from Buddy Rich to Archers of Loaf. Brand New was officially formed in 2000 in a basement in Merrick, New York. Their initial intention was always to "move outside of whatever notions they felt inclined to when they were making music as younger people." The band gained exposure in the local scene through playing shows with alternative rock contemporaries Midtown and post-hardcore bands like Glassjaw, while also self-releasing a four-song demo. The band's first show was at the Garden City bowling alley as the opener for Long Island hardcore band Silent Majority.
Brand New signed to Triple Crown Records just after their second-ever show. The band had released a demo for Warner Bros. Records, but the label did not believe that the band had a hit single in their catalog that was worth signing them for. In response, Lacey immediately wrote "Last Chance to Lose Your Keys" at the label office to serve as their single, but Warner Bros. declined to make an offer and Brand New ended up with Triple Crown instead.
Lane and Reilly came up with the band name Brand New, which Lacey said was "somewhat in jest because nothing about the band is really that new... we weren't trying to break ground with a new kind of sound or anything." Later, Lacey said that interpretation was not his original intention, claiming that "a friend of ours said he would call his band Brand New but he never got a new band so we took it. I wish it were something as clever as a sarcastic take on the state of music."
Brand New's debut studio album Your Favorite Weapon was produced by friend of the band Mike Sapone. The album has been described as being "bitter about ex-girlfriends", with an excessive concentration on "post-breakup angst". It received relatively positive reviews, with AllMusic awarding it three out of five and PopMatters also being favorable. It became a moderate success, selling over 50,000 copies. The record deal gave Brand New the opportunity to tour, playing alongside the likes of Taking Back Sunday and touring the UK in support of Finch, to a "great response" from the crowds. The band also played the first edition of the UK's Download Festival in 2003.
The only single released from Your Favorite Weapon was "Jude Law and a Semester Abroad". The song has been described by AllMusic as a "semi-hit" after it received airplay on both MTV2 and Fuse.
Feud with Taking Back Sunday
During their early years, Brand New was involved a highly publicized feud with fellow Long Island band Taking Back Sunday. Lacey was Taking Back Sunday's founding bassist and close friends with the band's guitarist John Nolan since fourth grade, with Nolan teaching Lacey how to play the guitar in high school. Nolan allegedly participated in an affair with Lacey's girlfriend at a house party, causing Lacey to leave Taking Back Sunday and eventually form Brand New. Brand New released the first song about the incident in 2001, "Seventy Times 7", named after the number of sins Jesus said one should be forgiven for, where Lacey wished death upon Nolan. Taking Back Sunday responded on 2002's "There's No 'I' in Team", where Nolan and frontman Adam Lazzara alternate vocals and directly quote lyrics from "Seventy Times 7".Brand New then released a shirt reading "Because mics are for singing, not swinging", insulting Lazzara's signature stage antics which once injured their bassist to the point of needing stitches. Taking Back Sunday followed with their own "Proudly swinging since 1999" shirt. The two bands toured together in 2002 and Lacey joined Taking Back Sunday on stage in Boulder, Colorado to perform "There's No 'I' in Team". Nolan also performed with Brand New. However, the feud was still unresolved. Nolan left Taking Back Sunday in 2003 after Lazzara cheated on Nolan's sister, leading Lacey to reconcile with Nolan and allegedly insult Taking Back Sunday at concerts again. In a December 2003 interview with Alternative Press, Lacey said, "We did something silly like write something about them on a T-shirt, and they took it so personally, going as far as to call our friends and physically threaten us... We wish Taking Back Sunday the best as a band, but I don't wish many good things on some people in the band." Nolan also wrote an apology song to Lacey with his new project Straylight Run, "Your Name Here ", which was released in 2004. The lyrics gave rough directions to Nolan's house at the time in Massapequa, offering Lacey to come visit him.
Taking Back Sunday guitarist Eddie Reyes told The New Yorker in 2004 that he was dissatisfied with his band being considered second-place to Brand New in the Long Island rock scene. In 2015, Lazzara rekindled the feud by calling Lacey a "dick" in an interview.
''Deja Entendu,'' acclaim and label bidding war (2003–2004)
Brand New's second studio album was written in the "year and-a-half or two years" that they were touring the material off of Your Favorite Weapon. According to drummer Brian Lane, "Jesse wrote a lot of the lyrics about different things than 'I just broke up with my girlfriend' for the new record," on an acoustic guitar in his bedroom. Lane also said the band's music tastes continued to expand, and that unlike their debut, a lot of time and concentration went into making the album. "I'm surprised that so many bands just keep putting out the same record as they did previously. We try to flex as much of our diversity muscles... as we can," Lacey said about growing the band's sound. Before the album was even released, the band sold out three shows of a 24-date US headlining tour with Moneen, Senses Fail, and The Beautiful Mistake solely off word-of-mouth and Internet message board hype. The band also earned a slot on the 2003 Warped Tour and as openers for Dashboard Confessional.Deja Entendu was released through Razor & Tie/Triple Crown Records on June 17, 2003. It began to receive international releases four months later. The album's title literally translates to "already heard" in French. It debuted at number 63 on the Billboard 200. After just seven weeks, the album's sales were at more than 51,000 copies, already closing in on the total figure of its predecessor. In May 2007, four years after its release, it was certified Gold for surpassing 500,000 sales in the United States by the Recording Industry Association of America.
The album's two singles, "The Quiet Things That No One Ever Knows" and "Sic Transit Gloria... Glory Fades", helped give the band exposure in the mainstream in contrast to how Your Favorite Weapon went "virtually unnoticed". Their music videos found "constant" airplay on MTV, and the band made its live television debut on Jimmy Kimmel Live!, performing "The Quiet Things That No One Ever Knows". Both singles entered the top 40 on the UK Singles Chart and "The Quiet Things That No One Ever Knows" peaked at number 37 on Billboard's Alternative Songs chart. In the wake of Deja Entendu, Brand New was pegged as an act to watch in Rolling Stone's annual "Hot Issue." The band topped punk critics' year-end lists with the "genre-defying" Deja Entendu, and the album was described as a "landmark album of so-called 'emo-punk'."
Following the album's release, Brand New sold out a headlining tour of the UK in January 2004 supported by Straylight Run, opened for Blink-182 in an arena tour of Australia, opened for Incubus in an arena tour of the UK and was slated to headline New Jersey's The Bamboozle festival in 2005 before canceling because of a member's health issues.